Till swollen with cunning, of a self-conceit,
His waxen wings did mount above his reach,
And, melting, heavens conspir'd his overthrow;
For, falling to a devilish exercise,
And glutted now with learning's golden gifts,
He surfeits upon cursed necromancy;
Nothing so sweet as magic is to him,
Which he prefers before his chiefest bliss:
And this the man that in his study sits.
: Dr. Faustus (Marlowe)

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

systems are down

i always thought that there would be a defining moment which i'd recognise, which would characterise me or bring to light my possible place... all i find is one day blending into the insignificant other.. is it cowardice to kill oneself or is it an act of courage? i can't seem to find the answer.. is that the only philosophical question left?? whether or not to live!!!

11 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Sinking deeper and deeper into the darkness of abyss... relishing the devoured and accursed splendor of the shadow less land... with the strength emanating from nothing but false love... Okaay... I’ll tell you a story.. It’s a story of six apples... The spring was busy and the branches hung fresh and blooming, covered with delicate pink blossoms that were just ready to open. Our six fellows, still blossom, were having discussion about their existence and its meaning. But the answer eluded them, so they decided to wait and let the time give them their answer. Time gave them their ripeness but not the answer. Then one day, a man came, picked one of them and got the juice out of it. The other five were amazed and glad to find their answer. Now they knew why they were here. Then next day another man came and picked one of the remaining five, converted it into apple sauce and confused the remaining four. Third day a man came and picked three apples. He used first one to make apple butter, second one to make pie filling and the third one to make vinegar. Our last apple, still hanging, went nuts after seeing all this... Alone he pondered the old question and a lot of new ones... Why was he here? Which one of the five answers was true? Why the answers didn’t seem complete? Why the whole of others was not consumed? In one case peel was discarded, in another it was used and in all cases seeds were thrown. If the seeds were of no use then why were they so deep inside? Isn’t it possible that all the apples were just used and it has nothing to do with the true purpose of our life? Thinking so, he decided to find the answer on his own. But the problem was from where to start. He looked down and thought why not from the point from where I came? So he disentangled himself from the surrounding beauty and went down under the earth. He had to go no further, with the first sprout came his answer... All he had to do was to stop blending one day into another one in hope for a moment to tell him the true answer. By searching it himself he prevented himself from being used and found that the answer was always in his view.Now to your second point... Do you believe we are alive?...... No sis, we were killed the day we born. And to keep us dead, we were positioned in this beautifully crafted web the very first day. With time only the title changes. The life given to us is not much different from an animals’. It’s all food and sex, of course with more refined ways. Look at the life of Buddha and you’ll get what I mean. He had the strength to break himself free from the web and to get himself reborn... The question of courage or cowardice is like having a dirty piece of stone in your hands and asking whether to use it to rip open the head of the king that sucks your blood or the head of the creditor who sucks your mind. But the first logical question is to know what is in your hands? ...Remove the dirt and you’ll always find something beautiful beneath, and it’ll make you realize the irrelevancy of the original question... The thing in your hand is not to throw away but to treasure...Without any philosophy the question is, when are you going to born? Are you alive??

I get it dude!!! I’m guessing you’re a man; no woman would be so cavalier with thoughts and ideas. I get the drift… the same apple can be made into juice, butter, vinegar, pie filling, and sauce or if you’re to believe an enterprising Russian, vodka. What I don’t get is why does strength to last in a shadowless land emerge from false love? I think it’s quite the opposite, only the fact of real affection can ensure existence where the sun doesn’t shine. I mean that would be the shadowless place; the others could be deep inside the earth or far into space inside a black hole…

Did you notice? The Apples were so bloody confused. They thought that the seeds were thrown away… they were worried that at times other bits were discarded. Did they ever have any inkling that what was thrown away were the good bits… that which couldn’t be devoured or squandered… seeds!!! Seeds being thrown away!!! Did you mean life was being wasted???? No way! Life was being saved by a very primeval defense mechanism.

If all were to go deep inside to their roots every one would have way in the bowels of the earth… doesn’t make any sense now does it?? Are we men or moles??? Is that why we make mountains out of molehills? All of those enlightened people who believe that the roots are where it all begins. Hah!

And as to your second point… actually methinks you don’t know how to count. Anyways, whatever it be! Point is, every one is alive. Just that some people know it and cherish it…while idiots remain unaware and live in the glitzy world of shopping malls and designer babies.

The only thing that I’m sure of about human beings is that the one and only potential of everything that’s born is to be dead. Dead today tomorrow or day after. Just dead!!!

Congratulations!!! ...You’ve just won a truckload of honey crisp apples fresh off the trees for the right guess... Yes, you got the drift but lost the direction, may be due to my inadequacy... Point was not that an apple can be converted into different products but that it was being converted by a man, an external factor... And they were not confused because the seeds or other bits were thrown away but because they were not able to know the product they will be converted to..... Actually, I based the story on Bad Faith of Sartre with an attempt to give a concrete answer at the end..... We can be used as a lawyer, businessman, clerk, soldier, waiter, minister, engineer etc, etc. as the need of the society arises. But the point is that these designations were created externally and we have to be any of them.... A kind of forced choice with ultimate result of internalization.... The last apple while thinking about the questions was actually applying the Freud’s explanation of the Bad Faith and finally he rejected it as Sartre did.... I left Sartre there because I needed an answer.

You are right, only real affection can give you great strength, that is why I used the word love, but I also used false... It means that in your heart you believe it is love but you are not aware that it is false. For example when a person kills another person in the name of religion, he believes in the doctrine of his religion and loves it. But you know that this love is false, a life is much more important than a religion.

You know, when you accept an analogy then you have to accept it in full. It is considered unfair to take some points literally just to counterattack.... We are not apples so we don’t have to be moles.... I don’t believe in vague terms so I don’t ask to search the roots... There are certain points from where the search can be started but I’m not going to discuss them here, it seems to me that you are not interested to find the answer yourself... The analogy was between the skin of the apple and human body, the flesh of the apple and human mind, the seeds of the apple and something that I don’t want to call soul but you are aware of it... It is something ageless and made useless in this world... It is this thing that is always thrown away.

Now... I’ll criticize Camus a little bit... I know it’s a blasphemy to judge a person of his stature and especially in front of his most promising disciple... So, in advance, I recognize your right to slap me, of course verbally... You talked about two types of people, one who know they are alive and others who are unaware... The latter ones are non existent for me so I was not talking about them... For the former ones I would say that they are aware of the dualism. ..They are like Sisyphus... They know the absurd but they have accepted it... It is like, if you can’t beat them, join them... I was not talking about them either.... I was talking about you and me and all others who are facing the paradox.... I don’t remember how I stumbled upon your blog but I do remember that it was the title of your blog that caught my attention. ...Insanity/ennui, a paradox, you know an insane can never have a feeling of ennui.... Your description of yourself, very beautiful inside/amazing outside, another paradox.... Now the latest one, I am alive/I am dead.. (Here you refuted your earlier statement, everyone is alive. May be I don’t know how to count but you are also forgetting it)..... The point that is baffling me is that why are you in denial mode now?... May be I was wrong from the start and I’m at the wrong place..... Well... Camus said that if we accept that life is meaningless and with no value, should we kill ourselves?... Now I differ from him here,... how are you going to judge the value of the life?... I mean if you have accepted the absurd then how can you make it a point of reference?... So to judge the value of life you need to have a reference point that is not absurd. ....When I said that you’ve to reborn it meant that you have to find a non absurd reference point to judge the value of life correctly.... Camus answer was that suicide must be rejected because without man absurd can not exist.... Now he left us exactly at the same point from where we started and I don’t want to talk how he treated Meursault.... He should have respected at least one point of the nihilists.... As I said earlier I don’t believe in vague terms so I rejected Husserl and Shestov and relied on something tangible and asked you to look at the life of Buddha and if it is too remote for you then you can go for Mother Teresa.

I agree with you about the inevitability of death... It is the only certain thing in this world... But not the death, the gap between the life and death is in question... The things filling this gap are in question... It is the question of control and be controlled... And it is the question of being alive before death!!!

Oh,depression..no hope..no meaning viz life..I guess the feelings are right ,but I doubt if the solution is right.At some time I suppose one should accept the reality,and tweak it,as much as one can(and this requires effort) to the one that is supposed to give one meaning,I suppose that is what is courage,facing and not avoiding by pretexts like suicide etc..Cheer up please.

No buddy.... there was no altercation here.... only genial pig tail pulling..... It’s just that I can discern her inside and she is grittily determined never to assert it... She is frantically fighting not to become a cop inside and I just intended to assist her win... People never tell candidly what they really think about others because they don’t want to see them advance in life... But I do and so as she... Now.. I can only wish her a serene mind... after blowing sixty candles out together.... so long.